Summary

Taft went into office "locked and loaded" for a Congressional fight over tariff revisions. During the GOP convention he pushed hard for inclusion of tariff reform in the Republican party platform. Nevertheless, Taft expected and found heavy resistance to reform among the older, established members of the House and Senate. But in the spring, Ida Tarbell published two pieces in The American Magazine that presented the tariff as a moral issue that affected the poor profoundly, even in increments of a single penny increase. Her article asserted that the "vast majority" of American families got by on $500 a year or less, which created generational poverty and limited opportunities for economic advancement. The income gap between the super-wealthy and the poor in America had never been greater, she claimed.

Prospects for immediate action in Congress appeared dim largely because House Speaker Joseph...